CONTENTS

      CHAPTER ONE

      CHAPTER TWO

      CHAPTER THREE

      CHAPTER FOUR

      CHAPTER FIVE

      CHAPTER SIX

      CHAPTER SEVEN

      CHAPTER EIGHT

      CHAPTER NINE

      CHAPTER ONE

      THE GIRL AT the table read her letter slowly, her neat brown head bowed over its single page, watched by everyone sitting with her. She came to the end and then started to read it over again, and the boy sitting beside her cried impatiently: ‘Polly, what’s it say? Do tell us, why…’

      ‘Hush, Ben.’ His mother, even more impatient than he was, spoke quietly. ‘Polly will tell us when she’s ready.’ She added hopefully: ‘Won’t you, dear?’

      The girl looked up and glanced round—they were all there, her mother, father, two very pretty sisters and the twelve-year-old Ben. ‘I’ve got the job,’ she said, and beamed at them all in turn as she handed the letter to her father. ‘Nine to five except Saturdays and Sundays, and a decent salary, too.’

      ‘Darling, that’s marvellous!’ exclaimed her mother, smiling at her youngest daughter—the plain one of the family and the one with the brains. Cora and Marian had no need of brains; they were so pretty that they would marry just as soon as they could decide which of their numerous boy-friends would make the best husband. Ben was still at school and clever too, but it was Polly, twenty years old, with a clutch of GCSEs and A-levels and a natural bent for dead languages, who had inherited her learned schoolmaster father’s clever head. And a good thing too, thought Mrs Talbot, for she had no looks to speak of—a slightly turned up nose, far too wide a mouth, even though it had soft curves, straight brown hair and a little too plump for her medium height. Her only good features were her eyes, large and brown, fringed by curling lashes which needed no mascara at all. They twinkled engagingly now. ‘It’s a lot of money,’ she said happily, and indeed for the Talbot family it was for there wasn’t a great deal to spare by the time Ben’s school fees had been paid and the rambling Victorian villa they lived in, with its elderly plumbing and draughts, was always in need of some vital repair or other. True, Cora and Marian both had jobs, cycling to nearby Pulchester, one to work in the public library on three afternoons a week, the other to spend her mornings in one of the town’s boutiques. She was paid a pittance, but she was allowed to buy her clothes there at a big discount and naturally enough all her money went on that, and since she and Cora were the same size and shape, she bought for her too, so that neither of them ever had a penny piece between them. But at least, as Mrs Talbot pointed out to her husband, they paid for their clothes and perhaps they would be able to find better jobs later on. Or marry, she added to herself hopefully.

      ‘When do you start, dear?’ asked Mrs Talbot.

      ‘Next Monday.’ Polly drew her straight brows together. ‘I’ll have to leave at half past eight, won’t I? It’s twenty minutes on the bike if I do go down Tansy Lane.’

      ‘What will you wear?’ asked Cora.

      Polly pondered for a moment. ‘A skirt and a blouse, I suppose, and a cardigan. It’ll be a bit chilly in the morning…’

      ‘Ne’er cast a clout till May be out,’ quoted Ben.

      Polly grinned at him. ‘Silly—it’s April for another two weeks. I must pop over to see the Vicar and borrow his Greek dictionary; Shylock had the last few pages of mine.’

      And presently, closeted with that learned gentleman, she explained why she needed it. ‘Sir Ronald Wise,’ she explained, raising her quiet voice a few tones in order to counteract his deafness. ‘He wanted someone to type his book—a very learned one comparing Ancient Greek and Latin as languages, you know. And of course it’ll be quicker if he has someone who understands a bit about it. I saw his advert in The Times and applied, and I’ve got the job.’

      The Reverend Mr Mortimer nodded his bald head. ‘That is excellent news, my dear. Your father must be proud of you.’

      He fetched the dictionary. ‘I shall be dining with Sir Ronald next week, he will doubtless tell me how you are getting on.’

      Polly left him presently, did a little shopping at the village stores for her mother and started for home. The house was a little way out of the village, halfway up a short steep hill, beside a lane which wound its way in a nonchalant fashion to the next village. She wandered up it, not hurrying, for the spring sunshine was warm and her basket heavy. She was almost home when a Range Rover came over the brow of the hill and stopped squarely in the middle of the lane, leaving her no room to pass, and its driver addressed her.

      ‘Wells Court—Sir Ronald Wise’s place?’ He was polite, but he was also in a towering rage; that she could see easily enough. He was very good-looking too, in a dark, beaky-nosed fashion. Polly studied his face. Everyone knew everyone else in her part of the world; this man was a stranger.

      Prepared to be friendly and in no hurry at all, she observed: ‘Good morning. Are you lost? People will take the short cut from Pulchester, you know, it looks so easy on the map, but if you don’t know your way around it’s twice as long.’

      His politeness was icy now. ‘I should be obliged if you would spare me your observations on rural communications. I realise that living in these—er—rustic conditions, time is not of paramount importance to you, but it is to me. Wells Court, if you would be so good…’

      Polly gave him a pitying look. Poor man, in a rage about nothing, and in such a hurry, too. ‘You need a rest and a cup of coffee,’ she said kindly. ‘I daresay you’ve come a long way. Turn left at the bottom of this lane, cross the village square and into the lane beside the church. Wells Court is a mile along the road—you can’t miss it.’ She added a friendly goodbye.

      His own goodbye held more than a hint of mockery, but she didn’t see that.